0:03

In 2009 several thousand children and

0:06

their families joined a world leading

0:08

study called Growing Up in New

0:10

Zealand. We started with pregnant mums

0:12

because we were interested in their

0:14

child growing up following around 7,000

0:16

children in the context of their

0:18

families over around about 21 years.

0:22

Those children are now teenagers and

0:24

the details collected about their lives

0:27

have fed numerous studies and

0:29

policies and media stories. It's

0:31

produced reports on the children's health

0:33

and wellbeing, how they're affected by

0:36

disability or depression, how they're going

0:38

through puberty, how housing and homelessness

0:40

affects them. Around a

0:42

thousand of them are Maori and

0:44

the study is revealing valuable information

0:46

about what could improve their health,

0:49

wellbeing and education. Every

0:52

person in policy formation in New Zealand

0:55

wants our children to do much

0:57

better than they are doing now. But

1:00

if we don't have reliable

1:02

data we can

1:04

only make our choices based on

1:06

bias, prejudice and dogma. But

1:09

last week it was revealed that the

1:11

government funded contract for Growing Up in

1:13

New Zealand was not renewed and future

1:15

funding is up in the air. In

1:18

the same week another long term

1:20

study into children's wellbeing was scrapped.

1:23

Stats NZ has ended its Living

1:25

in Aotearoa survey and there are

1:27

warnings that it leaves a big

1:29

gap in our understanding of child

1:31

poverty. How are we going to see

1:33

a look in to

1:36

children's lives and the impact of

1:38

poverty persistence that unfortunately without a

1:40

longitudinal survey I do worry that

1:42

we're not going to get as

1:44

rich a picture as we really,

1:46

really need to. So do

1:48

we really want to know about what's going on

1:51

in the lives of our young people? Do

1:53

we need to know? What

1:55

do we do with that information? Is

1:58

it too easy to throw it on the

2:00

ground? bonfire of public service cost cutting. I'm

2:03

Sharon Brekkalie. Today on the detail

2:05

we look at the uncertainty around

2:07

growing up in New Zealand and

2:09

the acting of Stat NZ's Living

2:12

in Aotearoa survey. Laura

2:14

Walters is Newsroom's political editor.

2:17

This Living in Aotearoa survey was

2:19

set up to measure whether

2:21

families or children were living in persistent poverty

2:23

and if you don't have that data then

2:25

you're not going to have a measure of

2:28

whether there's persistent poverty. So it might look

2:30

really good for the government. You might be

2:32

able to say, oh we haven't got very

2:34

many families living in persistent poverty but

2:37

can you say that truly if you

2:39

don't have the data to back it

2:41

up? Stat NZ kind of

2:43

held it up as this first

2:46

of its kind survey, reaching

2:48

gangs, reaching

2:50

children, living in hardship,

2:53

getting information about child

2:55

poverty. After just

2:57

two rounds of interviews it's

3:00

been scrapped. Is this embarrassing

3:02

for Stat NZ? I imagine

3:04

that Stat NZ did not

3:07

want to have to make

3:09

this decision. As

3:11

you said this was held up as a

3:14

first of its kind longitudinal

3:16

survey. It was meant

3:19

to be measuring child poverty especially

3:21

that persistent poverty measure. So understanding

3:23

which families were struggling to get

3:25

out of poverty or which ones

3:28

were drifting in and out of

3:30

poverty. As you say

3:32

that there was some really good

3:34

data collection going on there targeting

3:37

communities that are often kind of

3:39

fall through the cracks because they're

3:42

not captured by things like tax

3:44

data, if the adults in

3:46

the household aren't earning an income or

3:48

other administrative data isn't kind of capturing

3:50

them. So this was a way to

3:53

find all of those families

3:56

to capture data around those

3:58

children especially. at Satsens

4:00

Z were very proud of this survey

4:02

and it's really unlikely that they wanted

4:04

to cut it but like every other

4:06

ministry at the moment they'll have to

4:08

find efficiencies, they need to

4:11

cut programs, they need to cut jobs

4:13

and this while being a

4:15

very good quality data it's also

4:17

incredibly expensive to gather and they

4:20

found that it wasn't a really

4:22

inefficient way of getting these statistics

4:24

and gathering this data and so

4:27

yeah after just two rounds of

4:29

interviews they have had to cut

4:31

this survey. Costing

4:33

roughly $20 million each year to

4:36

pull the data together for this

4:38

survey. That wasn't really

4:40

a true representation of how much this

4:43

was costing so $20.7 million a

4:46

year across all of their work to

4:48

measure child poverty data

4:50

but actually this living in Aotearoa

4:53

study was costing them much more.

4:56

They weren't able to supply the exact

4:58

figure to me when I asked for

5:00

it but we know that there were

5:02

cost blowouts when it came to

5:04

this survey and it's

5:06

not on its own there but in

5:08

terms of the cost blowouts it is becoming

5:10

increasingly expensive to gather data and especially

5:12

to gather this type of data, that

5:14

longitudinal work where they're going back to

5:16

the same people over and over again,

5:18

where they're having to build trust, build relationships,

5:21

make sure that they're not dropping out

5:24

of the survey or the study. It's

5:26

really expensive. Full disclosure,

5:28

I was actually a participant in this

5:30

survey and the amount of chasing that

5:33

the person had to do to find

5:35

a, you know, to get us to

5:37

agree to be in the survey, to

5:39

find a good time to sit down,

5:41

it's hours worth of questions backwards and

5:43

forwards. There's a lot of work to

5:45

get marginalised and hard

5:47

to reach communities to engage in

5:50

this survey and this data collection

5:52

and that can literally mean these

5:55

interviewers traipsing across the countryside

5:58

into huts, into places. that

6:00

aren't in urban centers where they can just

6:02

go door to door knocking and finding people

6:05

to sign up. They're having to go into

6:08

communities that they don't have good connections with

6:10

and find these people and convince them to

6:12

take part in it and convince them to

6:14

stay as part of the survey. So it's

6:17

incredibly expensive. People are

6:19

time poor. They don't want to

6:21

participate in these types of lengthy

6:23

interviews and interviews that come up every year

6:26

or every couple of years. There

6:28

are lots of reasons why this is incredibly expensive and

6:30

there are cost blowouts for this survey but for

6:33

a lot of other surveys as well. And I

6:35

have to ask you, how did you get

6:37

to be part of it? So

6:39

after the census in 2023, a

6:43

person knocked at my door and they

6:45

said that they were doing this Living

6:47

in Aotearoa survey and asked if our

6:50

household would be part of it. And

6:53

I know how hard it is to get people

6:55

to sign up to these types of things and

6:57

also how important it is to have good

7:01

quality data. So I agreed and

7:03

the poor woman who was our

7:06

interviewer, she

7:08

had so much patience. We exchanged

7:10

so many text messages but eventually

7:13

myself and my partner both did

7:15

separately this survey with her and

7:18

the questions covered all

7:20

kinds of areas. Obviously when

7:22

we're talking about poverty there are

7:24

things around your income and your

7:26

disposable income, whether you could

7:28

afford to heat your house, whether you had

7:30

any mould in your house, whether you could

7:32

buy fruits and vegetables and

7:35

proteins, whether you ever could afford

7:37

to go on a holiday, how

7:39

your mental health was. Well

7:42

as Laura says, a special part

7:44

of the Living in Aotearoa survey

7:46

was its focus on poverty persistence,

7:49

something that's really difficult to

7:51

measure but is required under

7:53

the Child Poverty Reduction Act.

7:56

Here's Dr Claire Akhma, the

7:58

Chief Children's Commissioner. not

8:00

something that right now we have a

8:02

deep understanding of in Aotearoa New Zealand.

8:05

We don't understand the exact extent

8:07

to which the numbers of

8:09

children are experiencing persistent poverty.

8:11

So losing this survey means

8:14

that we are going to, we really

8:16

need to look at how we're going to

8:18

get an understanding of that picture when it

8:20

comes to this group of

8:22

particularly disadvantaged children and young

8:25

people in Aotearoa. And how

8:27

is that information gathered? You

8:31

know when you want to try and

8:33

measure poverty persistence and over

8:36

time, how do you do that? Yes,

8:38

so that was the really valuable

8:41

thing about the Living in Aotearoa

8:43

survey. It was a purpose built

8:45

and designed survey that had taken

8:47

a number of years to design.

8:49

So they actually involve field workers,

8:51

survey collectors going out into people's

8:54

homes, into their photo, into their

8:56

communities, sitting with them and

8:58

actually working through the survey, asking them

9:00

a series of questions and in this

9:03

instance it was going to be over the course of

9:05

six years asking those same questions

9:07

to build up a picture over

9:09

time. And it would have been

9:11

really understanding the why and the

9:14

how because through something like administrative

9:16

data sources we can get quite

9:18

a good understanding of the what

9:21

but we can't get to that richer

9:23

level of detail about the why and

9:25

the how. And here I'm talking about the

9:27

why and the how around persistent

9:29

poverty and the impacts it

9:31

has on children's lived experience

9:34

every day. This

9:36

is costly and time consuming.

9:38

These longitudinal surveys cost millions

9:40

and millions of dollars. Well

9:42

look I completely acknowledge the fiscal

9:45

constraints in the environment that we're

9:47

working in right now but that doesn't

9:49

get us away from the fact that

9:52

good data is essential if we

9:54

are to make progress in our country when

9:56

it comes to the outcomes and the rights

9:58

of children. And you

10:00

know right now we have a government that

10:02

is committed to a social investment approach grounded

10:05

in evidence and data to

10:07

inform policies and investment. And

10:09

so we really do need to

10:11

actually be doubling down on data

10:14

that helps us to understand children's

10:17

lives, helps to shape where we

10:19

focus those policies and that investment

10:21

that's going to actually be

10:23

effective and responsive to address some

10:26

of these big issues that are affecting

10:28

children's lives and then more so also

10:30

so that we can track and

10:32

understand and measure progress over time. I

10:35

think when we hear about these longitudinal

10:37

studies about life in New Zealand we

10:40

immediately think of the Dunedin one, the

10:42

famous one that's more than 50 years

10:44

old now. And I think some people

10:47

might say well we've already got one,

10:49

we've already got one that tells us

10:52

how people are growing up in New Zealand and

10:54

what their lives are like, why do we need

10:57

two others? Well

10:59

look absolutely we have been leading the

11:01

game in longitudinal studies and it comes

11:03

to children's lives in our country for a

11:06

long time. However why

11:08

we need to have contemporary studies

11:11

such as living in Aotearoa, the

11:13

survey around persistent poverty and

11:16

growing up in New Zealand around

11:18

contemporary experiences of childhood

11:20

in Aotearoa is that they

11:22

give us that up-to-date picture

11:24

and the up-to-date data that

11:27

can help to inform decisions,

11:29

policies and investments in

11:31

real time. The other thing that

11:33

I would say about growing up in

11:36

New Zealand is that now we see

11:38

the direct views of children and

11:40

young people coming through in that

11:43

survey data and

11:45

you know all children have a right to participate

11:47

in the decisions that affect them and so the

11:49

fact that we have their views coming

11:51

through means that even more strongly we

11:53

can help to inform the policies and

11:55

investments that they are saying they need

11:58

in their lives. So that's really really

12:00

powerful and that contemporary

12:02

view is what we're going to be

12:04

missing out on here if we

12:06

don't have these surveys and studies. So

12:09

it's a waiting game for the growing

12:11

up in New Zealand study. No one's

12:13

saying too much but we do know

12:15

that Auckland University is working on a

12:18

plan to keep it going and the

12:20

government is also looking at funding options.

12:22

But what about that crucial

12:25

information about poverty persistence that

12:27

we know so little about

12:29

that stats NZ's Living in

12:31

Aotearoa study was going to

12:34

answer. Laura Walters again. They

12:36

think that now they can

12:38

gather that data from other means. So

12:41

a mix of administrative data, so things

12:43

that already exist like tax data for

12:45

instance and the Household Economic Survey which

12:48

is a really good fit for purpose

12:50

survey but it doesn't have that longitudinal

12:53

aspect. It's just a snapshot in time.

12:56

So they think that might be a more effective or efficient

12:58

way of gathering the starter. But that's

13:00

not what everybody thinks is it? I

13:02

mean you talk to Kate Prickett

13:05

from Victoria University who's very

13:07

concerned about it being squabbed.

13:11

Exactly. So people who know far

13:13

more about statistics and social and

13:15

household statistics than I do are

13:17

really worried about this ending.

13:20

They don't believe that using other

13:22

data available like the Household Economic

13:24

Survey or administrative data will do

13:26

the tricks. They say it'll just

13:29

be kind of a hodgepodge

13:31

mix of things thrown together and there

13:34

will be people who are missed. So

13:36

there'll be people who slip through the

13:38

cracks especially those more vulnerable people that

13:40

are harder to get data from.

13:43

There's also people like as well

13:45

as the statisticians and people who

13:47

work in that area. There are

13:50

child poverty experts and people

13:52

like the Chief Children's Commissioner

13:54

who are incredibly concerned About

13:57

this. They Say that if you want. The

14:00

policies and the most effective policies.

14:02

You also need to have the

14:04

best starter. And it's not about

14:06

finding efficiencies or cost effective ways

14:08

of gathering data, it's about finding

14:10

the rich, highest quality data so

14:12

that you can target on his

14:14

policies to those kids and make

14:16

sure that the money. Is going where it

14:18

needs to go. At makes you

14:20

wonder about longer to to. New suits.

14:22

A full stop does. Not like clearly

14:24

they cost millions and millions to run.

14:27

It is much more difficult to get

14:29

back to the same people year after

14:31

year, time after time. I mean as

14:34

this whole area up for a Se

14:36

cupp do you think. It. Does

14:38

seem that way. I'm at a you

14:40

know it is as you say it's

14:42

it's not just as living and out

14:44

head or survey that having issues is

14:46

of course also that the growing up

14:48

in New Zealand and study that is

14:50

am you know it's future of up

14:52

in the air the end and more

14:54

broadly ignored you're at the or issues.

14:57

With longer choose know research at both in.

14:59

New Zealand and overseas. but there's

15:01

a reason that does. Researchers from

15:03

with spoken about the richness.

15:05

Of the Dasa, the quality of the Dasa

15:07

going back to these. These families and

15:09

these people year after year and. Seeing

15:11

how the lives have changed and

15:14

house different policies have. Am I

15:16

just had an impact on the

15:18

him in their life sites? Yes,

15:20

it's incredibly expensive. Yes, it's very

15:22

difficult am to do. And so.

15:25

Maybe right now when you know

15:27

it's. Not just New

15:29

Zealand that countries around the world of

15:31

facing cost of living crises and a

15:33

trying really hard to tighten their belts.

15:35

Maybe this isn't seen as a priority

15:37

area. Difficult

15:39

thing: his role that the counterfactual is this:

15:41

if you don't spend the money on this,

15:44

you could. end up having a lot

15:46

of policies that aren't targeted and the

15:48

right areas and spin you in that

15:50

with this thing called leaky says policies

15:52

right we the government spending millions or

15:54

maybe even billions of dollars on on

15:56

things like well see a or at

15:58

policies targeted to vulnerable groups and

16:00

there's no way to measure whether it's getting to

16:03

the right people and whether it's actually having an

16:05

impact or having the impact that they want. So

16:08

while it's expensive to get this

16:10

data it might also be saving

16:12

us money or making sure that

16:14

money is well spent in the

16:16

long run. So potentially cutting these

16:18

is quite short-sighted. And you could

16:20

argue that the government at the

16:22

time could use it as you

16:24

know not having the data could

16:26

use it as an excuse for

16:28

not funding a program.

16:30

You know like I'm talking about child

16:32

poverty which is which is an area

16:35

that has a very big gap in

16:37

knowledge I understand. Yeah

16:39

exactly so it's hard to

16:41

say that something isn't working

16:43

or that something is tracking

16:46

poorly if you don't have the data

16:48

to say that. So I guess another

16:51

way of saying that is this Living

16:53

in Aotearoa survey was set up to

16:56

measure whether families or children were living in

16:58

persistent poverty and if you don't have that

17:00

data then you're not going to have a

17:02

measure of whether there's persistent poverty. So it

17:05

might look really good for the government you

17:07

might be able to say oh we

17:09

haven't got very many families living in persistent

17:11

poverty but can you say that

17:13

truly if you don't have the data to

17:16

back it up? So yeah if you don't

17:18

have the data there to measure something or

17:20

to back something up then I guess you

17:22

can't really hold a government to account can

17:24

you? And I think that this really

17:27

gets to kind of an

17:30

interesting issue with this particular

17:32

government who to borrow a phrase from

17:34

the Prime Minister Christopher Luxon is... So

17:36

we are going to be ruthlessly focused

17:38

on outcomes and we're going to continue

17:40

to be focused on delivering results for

17:42

all New Zealanders. So this government has

17:44

spoken a lot about setting

17:46

targets about measuring outcomes about

17:49

using data to hold itself to account

17:52

and to make sure that it knows that it's

17:54

spending money in the right places and not wasting

17:56

money but if you don't have The

17:58

data the high quality... A

18:02

Motorbike Targets Name what to those outcomes,

18:04

Name what they than stand for. You

18:06

know, end that. The government's also been

18:09

speaking about bringing back that focus on

18:11

am social investment which was pioneered a

18:13

New Zealand by said Bill English which

18:15

means a specific targets hang of funding

18:17

and policies to those who need it

18:19

most so rather than it's kind of

18:21

broad brush spending. On a general group

18:23

of really specific targeting of money again you

18:26

can't do that if you don't have the

18:28

dasa to know exactly where that money needs

18:30

to go. and so yeah they are always

18:32

trade offs that cough cussing and it might.

18:35

It might mean that things looks good for

18:37

the government because like he sees the in

18:39

they can't We don't have the dasa to

18:42

say when things are going wrong but they

18:44

also don't you know able to misha with

18:46

the you his effect of policies and at

18:48

the indices I surely. That's what any government

18:51

wants to do. And plumbing. A set

18:53

of policies and make sure they get good

18:55

return on investment. Data. Released

18:57

and two children. The state.

18:59

This needs to be about party

19:01

politics So I for example when

19:03

it comes to the upper of

19:06

tell poverty I'm calling for the

19:08

to be an ongoing project of

19:10

national significance from successive governments. And

19:12

what that means is that it

19:14

needs commitment of the time off

19:17

from governments to. Policies and investments

19:19

that had gone to help drive

19:21

us food and make progress on.

19:23

Lifting children out of poverty to do

19:25

that. We need his good data. So

19:27

what do you want? You want? Susan's

19:30

hate for the growing up in New

19:32

Zealand? Study? And what do you won't

19:34

say? they love it Or loving and

19:36

out here Or study to be reinstated?

19:38

What? What would you like to happen?

19:41

when when it comes to living in

19:44

l zero i think when we're clear

19:46

that the government statistician the decision has

19:48

been made to stop that says it

19:51

has stopped and that state see zealand

19:53

has said that they will be using

19:55

incensed and and incense vision of the

19:58

household economic survey and to to be

20:00

able to measure persistent poverty. So

20:02

what I'll be looking to do

20:05

in terms of that survey is

20:07

to really understand what does an

20:09

enhanced household economic survey actually mean

20:11

and how are we going to get to the

20:14

level of richness of detail that we need to

20:16

around the what and the how

20:18

of the impact of poverty persistence on

20:20

children. When it comes to growing up

20:22

in New Zealand, I'm really pleased that

20:25

Minister Epstein has said that this government

20:27

does want to continue that survey and

20:29

that it's looking at funding options and

20:32

I really encourage that. I want to

20:35

see that survey continue. These

20:37

children are now coming up to

20:39

age 14, 15. We

20:41

followed them over time now through

20:43

their early childhood into school, coming

20:45

now into the teenage years and

20:48

the richness of that picture and

20:50

understanding of children's lives, their development,

20:52

their health, their well-being is

20:55

pretty incredible and it's a world-leading

20:57

survey. How close can you get

20:59

to the Minister like Louise Epstein,

21:01

the person who's making the ultimate

21:03

decision on the funding and really

21:05

push the case? I mean, do

21:07

you feel like the decision

21:10

makers are listening to you? I

21:13

meet regularly with Minister Epstein and

21:15

with ministers across the government and

21:18

so we are often speaking about

21:20

the issues that really matter to

21:22

children in this country and to

21:24

their rights and to advancing those

21:26

things. So in my conversations

21:28

with the Minister, I'll keep bringing

21:30

forward the importance of us

21:32

having that robust, disaggregated

21:34

data, including longitude and

21:37

order about children. I

21:39

am encouraged by the fact that she

21:41

said that the government is committed to

21:43

continuing to have data from

21:45

things like growing up in New Zealand and I

21:47

really just encourage her and

21:49

the government to follow through on

21:52

what they've seen around looking into

21:54

continuing the funding for growing

21:56

up in New Zealand and when it comes to

21:58

living in Aotearoa. really looking

22:00

hard at how

22:03

we are going to not lose

22:05

that richness of picture that we need to

22:07

about poverty persistence that affects children and whānau

22:10

in our country. But it's too late really

22:12

isn't it? I mean we have lost it.

22:16

Yeah well sadly when it comes to living

22:18

in Aotearoa it does seem that it is

22:20

too late so now the focus does

22:22

need to go on how is

22:24

that enhanced household economic survey that

22:26

New Zealand talks about what's it

22:28

actually going to look at how

22:30

we are going to ensure that

22:32

it gets as rich a

22:35

picture as it possibly can. How are

22:37

we going to see a look in

22:39

to children's lives in the impact of

22:42

poverty persistence that unfortunately without a longitudinal

22:44

survey I do worry that we are

22:46

not going to get as rich a

22:48

picture as we really really need to.

22:53

That's it for today the

22:55

detail is supported by RNZ

22:57

and NC Rauneir. Jeremy Veal,

22:59

engineer of this K-pass, Alexia

23:01

Russell and Divina Zima produced

23:03

it. Thanks to Laura Walters

23:05

and Dr Claire Akhmad. I'm

23:07

Sharon Brekkeli, thank you.